


breathing free and even

by rileys



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-24
Updated: 2015-03-24
Packaged: 2018-03-19 09:18:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3604734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rileys/pseuds/rileys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In August, there's a transfer degree Q&A in the first floor conference room of their community college, and they bump into each other for the first time. More specifically, Nick gets half a cup of hot coffee spilled on him, and an armful of scrawny white limbs and plaid flannels, thanks to some dickwad shoulder-checking people at the refreshment table.</p>
<p>(Or, “Nick Fury’s List Of 5 Times He Really, Really Loved This Dweeb, and The Two Nights That Made Him Write a List In The First Place”.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	breathing free and even

**Author's Note:**

> content warnings: violence/blood, emetophobia/vomit, hospitalization/fear of hospitalization. 
> 
> thiiiiis is a mess i wrote mostly back in 2012/2013 as posts on a sideblog, and then decided to finally put together in one place. and much like my other AU (also written way back when), because my main point of reference happened in 2012, this fic also adapts a particular scene from Avengers, hence that blood/violence warning. don't worry, don't worry, there is no character death. he's fine. go forth. 
> 
> (fic title from "There Will Be No Divorce" by The Mountain Goats)

1.

In August, there's a transfer degree Q&A in the first floor conference room of their community college, and they bump into each other for the first time.

More specifically, Nick gets half a cup of hot coffee spilled on him, and an armful of scrawny white limbs and plaid flannels, thanks to some dickwad shoulder-checking people at the refreshment table.

Nick warily holds the rest of the cup away from the kid who got knocked into him, still trying to get his balance.

“Sorry,” says the kid in the flannels as he leans away, his sleeve dripping with coffee and the tips of his ears turning pink with embarrassment.

Nick shrugs and passes him a handful of napkins, more focused on finding a seat and trying to ignore the snickering from other students who saw them get bounced around. He spots two empty chairs in the back row; good enough.

The kid in the flannels—way oversized, but warm and cheap, like Nick’s hoodie—is mopping coffee from his hand with a napkin, looking kind of pathetic, so Nick glances at his name tag and decides to be friendly.

“Phil, right?” Nick says, and nods towards the free seats.

Phil grins, thin and tired in a way no college kid’s smile ought to be, and his beat-up sneakers shuffle on the carpet as he follows Nick to the last row of folding chairs.

The Q&A is straightforward. They take notes on optional transfer credits, they make simultaneous low noises of annoyance at a question about the school’s lack of electives. It’s all pretty standard.

Except the part where Nick misses an entire discussion on out-of-state articulation agreements because he’s distracted by Phil’s too-neat handwriting, and how the off-brand band-aid around the base of Phil’s ring finger loosens when Phil’s knuckles go white, his hand clenched around his pen, while the speaker tells them about the incoming tuition hike.

“Yeah,” Nick says under his breath.

After a quick question on textbook buybacks, the Q&A is over, and the other students are already standing to leave, feet shuffling and messenger bags sliding off chairs. Phil stands too, sliding his notebook into his bag with some hesitation.

In the end, all Phil says is a casual “see you around” as he’s turning to go. Nick sits still, watching Phil’s hand hang at his side, his thumb worrying at the ends of the loose band-aid, the edge of his sleeve still softly stained with coffee.

Nick buries all the thoughts lurking in the back of his head, about Phil’s hands and the tips of his ears and his worn-out smile, and he keeps trying to push it down all the way to the financial aid office, picking up a copy of his schedule for the fall.

_One more semester_ , he tells himself, and focuses in on that instead.

* * *

2.

“I can’t tell if this is the Court or the Plaza,” Phil says, defeat clear on his face as he stares at the mall directory. “I don’t think I even know up from down anymore.”

“We’re not just here to hit the bookstore,” Nick reminds him. He glances around the stores nearby; nothing interesting, and some things only in a Tony Stark kind of price range, but they’re here. They may as well look. “We’ll find it eventually,” he decides, pointing off down a corridor.

“Up for some recon?” Phil asks. He abandons the directory, grinning as he leaves it to join Nick.

“Recon?” Nick repeats, raising an eyebrow. Phil shrugs, owning it. “You watch too many action movies,” Nick assures him, but it comes out sounding sweet, and Phil looks pretty happy with himself.

They keep their hands in their pockets, glancing into stores here and there. The mall is pretty busy for September, but at least they're not fighting the Christmas rush for winter session textbooks.

Phil points out a toy store to grab something for his baby niece; Nick sneaks away to covertly look the Lego shelves up and down, playing cool with an approving nod when Phil comes back with a large, green (and pretty adorable) stuffed frog.

A bit of wandering later Nick points out a bargain bin of video games, thumbing through for something he can make use of; Jim Rhodes sold Nick his Gamecube for twenty bucks, but no games. Phil suggests Mario Party, and Nick goes along with it.

They walk past some comparatively pricey clothing stores after that, with Phil doing running commentary of every hipster and yuppie they pass, and Nick struggling to hold his laughter down.

Further down the hall, Phil makes gooey eyes at some ancient Captain America Trading Cards in a collectible shop’s window—Nick can’t fight the gooey eyes. He follows Phil in despite knowing what’s to come, and he’s there to watch every microscopic twitch in the shift of Phil’s expression, going through the five stages of grief at the sight of the price tag.

Phil opts to drown his sorrows in sesame chicken at the food court, a single order split between them since they’re saving their money for books. He mostly just pokes at the styrofoam with his chopsticks, lacking his geeky energy from before.

Nick tries to think of how to be sympathetic, but he’s also pretty sure they’re still playing the game, just two dudes in a food court; he should laugh it off. No getting real. He picks up the bag from the toy store, holding it up, and keeps his face completely steady in the kind of fake-ass sympathy look all the faculty advisors have perfected.

“Do you need to hug the frog?” Nick deadpans.

Phil laughs, almost chokes on some rice, and then laughs more. He’s good, Nick figures, and smirks along. When Phil goes back to eating, he’s grinning at his food and the tips of his ears look a little pink, but Nick isn’t reading too much into it.

Okay, maybe he is.

When they’re getting ready to leave the food court, trash thrown out and tray returned, Nick sees Phil reaching down for the bag on the floor and takes a chance—idly lowering his hand towards the bag at the same time.

It’s not a great move, and it’s probably not subtle, but it’s worth the seeming-accidental nudge of Phil’s hand against his, while Nick pretends to be completely oblivious, staring away.

Phil’s fingers lay loose over his, just a moment of indulgence, but it tells Nick things are where he thought they were. They’re still playing their roles, and they still walk with their hands in their pockets all the way to the bookstore.

But Phil walks there deliberately positioned at Nick’s right side, where Nick has the peripheral vision to glance over and see Phil’s small, shy smile, and just once, Nick catches Phil looking, too.

They grab the books they need for the semester, only one copy between them for any book that’s on both their lists. Phil comes up a dollar short at the register, but Nick’s got his back; he coolly passes over some change, bullshitting about Phil picking up the tab for lunch and Nick forgetting to pay him back.

“Thanks, man,” Phil says, not managing to be cool about it at all.

Nick shrugs, and pretends it’s a teasing shoulder-check when he brushes his arm against Phil’s on the way to the next open register.

* * *

3.

In February, they're miserable for brand new reasons since leaving the community college, but they've always been good at strategy. They find ways to make it fun.

“You’re all brain and no game, Coulson!” he laughs, and ducks behind a tree. Three snowballs strike the trunk, too precise, easy to predict. Even easier, the fourth when he feints out of cover. “Try a real throw!”

“You realize gloating makes you easier to hit!” Phil calls from across the grounds, but he’s laughing halfway through, slurring a little, tongue a bit numb with snow from the earlier hit. Nick got a few good hits in—last time he actually got eyes on Phil, he was red-faced and brushing snow from his eyes. “Not sure you thought this one through!”

“Oh, trust me,” Nick says to himself, shaping another snowball between his gloves. “I did.”

Nick feints right and then darts left from the tree, behind the fort he built with the walkway as a foundation (he knows the terrain of the green, he was ready for this) and waits for the volley of snowballs to pelt the cover on the right side, except they don’t.

Silence. Stillness.

Not good.

He eases his head up to peer over the wall, except all he sees are snow-soaked jeans and Phil Coulson with an armload of snowballs, standing right in front of his fort.

“I thought we agreed,” Nick says, flopping back on the snow with a chuckle regardless, “No close range combat.”

“Always do what your enemy will least expect,” Phil fires back, grinning, and then drops his whole arsenal to bounce harmlessly off the walls.

Nick smirks up at him from the snow, and Phil—not as unorthodox as he claims, because he’s glancing around to make sure they’re alone, even as dark and fucking _freezing_ as it is tonight that no one else would be—steps over the fort and drops down next to him, laughing visibly into the night air.

“My hands were getting numb anyway,” Phil admits, turning his head to grin un-guarded, at Nick.

Nick laughs at the excuse (like he doesn’t know why Phil gave up already), and rolls over to sit up, swings one knee over Phil’s waist, layers of pants soaked through and not even feeling the cold after twenty minutes of strategies and stalemates in the snow.

He glances around, just to be sure—they’re both a little paranoid, and maybe Nick likes that, maybe he likes that Phil is cautious, is just as afraid as he is—and then leans down, catches Phil’s bottom lip between his teeth while Phil’s leg unsubtly nudges between his legs.

“I like how you negotiate,” Nick says.

“Save it for the dorm room, Romeo,” Phil laughs, smirking, and pulls Nick’s hat down over his eyes.

Phil kisses him back anyway, quick and smiling and then smoothly rolling away, grinning over his shoulder.

Nick has about two seconds to lie still and get the affectionate laugh out of his system, before a flawlessly lobbed snowball bursts square across his forehead.

“I’mma get you for that one, Coulson!” he yells, like it’s just another day on campus, and they’re just having another fight with the frats again.

He smiles, big and ridiculous and probably out of his mind, and then heads to his dorm, waiting the usual five minutes before Phil climbs the tree by the window.

“I’ll show you ‘all brain and no game’,” is all Phil says, grinning like a challenge accepted, and then they’re laughing and fumbling and, well—Nick’s maybe starting to reconsider his assessment.

* * *

4.

_If you don’t see me in the first three days of exam week_  
_I, yet being of sound mind and not in the midst of crunch-time_  
_Grant full permission for you to investigate._  
_-P. Coulson_

Nick thinks the sticky note inside his window is funny, until the fourth day of finals without so much as a half-hysterical text.

Unlike with Nick's building, there are no branches outside Phil’s dorm room window to sneak in through. It would be convenient, especially now that their unseasonably cold April is over and the leaves have had a month to cover up the trees again.

Thankfully, even without the shortcut, Nick has met enough people in Phil's building to sneak through. Maria still owes him for The Incident That Will Go Forever Unmentioned, and she's always happy to let him in.

He shoulders and glares his way past the rest of Phil’s dorm-mates, until he hits the right room. And, as with anything else, it’s not as simple as he hoped.

“C’mon, Phil,” demands the redhead banging on the door, her eyes dangerous. “If you don’t open up, I’m gonna force-feed you the crackers!”

Nick likes her style, but not when it’s directed at Phil.

“I got it,” he says, holding out a hand. She raises an eyebrow, but shrugs and passes him the pack of salt crackers anyway. “Hey, Bookworm Phil,” Nick calls, and raps his knuckles on the door. “Sound Mind Phil sent me to drag you outta here.”

There’s a long silence, and the redhead flexes her fingers like she’s about to steal back her crackers, but half a minute in, the door finally cracks open. Phil glares at them both, or tries to; he mostly just looks kind of sad and exhausted.

“I’m going to fail Calc,” Phil tells them, and opens the door the rest of the way.

“No, you’re not,” Nick sighs. He holds out the crackers, nods at the room. “Cool if I come in?” Phil shrugs, the redhead smirks and walks briskly away, and Nick pretends to be the Responsible Friend for all of five seconds until he closes the door behind him.

“I definitely am,” Phil says, and Nick does some nudging and halfhearted rattling off of studies on sleep deprivation and mental performance, but Phil’s headed for the bed already, looking like he’s either going to throw up or cry, or both.

Nick really isn’t sure this whole thing between them is at the point of “totally okay if your dude throws up on you”, but he picks up Phil’s heavy limbs to push him under the blankets. Phil mumbles about failing again, so Nick picks up the Calc textbook too, and starts reading off the chapter Phil covered in the most sticky notes, word to word while Phil curls up next to him.

“You could be a movie announcer,” Phil mumbles deliriously, his arms wrapped around Nick’s leg for dear life.

Nick sighs and pats his sandy hair, as calming as he knows how to be, and resumes reading about infinite series.

Phil doesn’t throw up on him after all.

* * *

5.

July is full of bad decisions, with their couch-surfing ranking pretty high on the list. Especially couch surfing at the weird rich kid's house. Nick has crashed here often with Jim Rhodes, one of the ROTC guys, but it's the first time he's brought Phil. It's also the first time they've been stranded here overnight during a party, thanks to being in between minimum wage paychecks for car repairs.

And because that's not enough first times, it's also the first time he's seen Phil completely hammered.

They collapse in a heap in an unoccupied corner of Stark’s place, rubbery-limbed and unsteady on their feet. The world tilts a little when Nick squeezes his eyes shut.

“I don’t trust those guys from upstate,” Phil mumbles.

“Can’t believe you drank a cup of straight vodka,” Nick says, folding an arm around Phil’s back and resting his chin on Phil’s shoulder. Phil is right, though; Nick's been watching those same guys for shady behavior every second since he walked in.

“Seemed like a good…” Phil stops, makes a miserable noise. “Everything is spinning. How does that stop?”

“Just put your head down.” Nick pulls Phil’s cheek onto his shoulder. “Lightweight,” he accuses, and Phil laughs.

“You fell here, too,” Phil says, nudging Nick’s chest with a clumsy hand. “You barely drank anything.”

“Yeah, well.” Nick doesn’t finish, and Phil laughs into his turtleneck.

“I hear you, I hear you,” Phil slurs. “Won’t do it again.”

Nick counts ‘poor booze tolerance’ in points against Phil, but even when he adds in the points for ‘snores in his sleep’, he doesn’t exactly push Phil off, either.

On his way to drag Phil to a less cramped spot to sleep off the booze, he dodges the frat guys and particularly dodges their host, who's playing Frankenstein with two toasters and a Macbook.

The two of them fall asleep on the floor in another room, half passed out on the carpet. Nick slings his arm over Phil’s shoulders out of sheer over-cautious habit; Phil winds up burrowed against his chest in the morning, shivering in the chill of the house, heating budget sacrificed for the keg budget, if Nick knows the Stark party scheme as well as he thinks.

Nick squirms away for dignity’s sake, but he brings an extra cup of awful instant coffee from Stark’s war zone of a kitchen, and offers his jacket for Phil to shield his eyes, hung over and grateful, maybe genuinely friendly.

That’s about when the toaster-Macbook-toaster contraption explodes across the house from them, and Nick laughs when Phil nearly jumps three feet in the air from where he’s sitting.

“You get used to that here,” Nick manages to assure him through laughter.

“Damn it, Tony!” yells Rhodes, unmistakable in some far corner of the house.

Nick jumps up with a grin, dragging all of Phil's sleepy limbs along after him for front row seats for the chewing-out that follows, well worth the sting of their hangovers.

* * *

+1.

In the end, July and August came and went, with their bad decisions and small hurdles. So did September. Even at their worst and weirdest, the things that go wrong over the summer are all pretty forgettable. 

October is the month Nick will remember. October is going to stick to him, and he already knows it in the back of his mind, creeping cold and dark in the base of his skull.

For the immediate moment, Nick is just running, and he is deliberately not panicking.

He’s not regretting asking Phil to join the Student Monitors for campus security. He’s not regretting telling Phil to check around the north side of campus while Nick stayed to calm down the evacuated dorm. He’s not regretting taking charge during the bomb threat while the faculty advisors for campus security locked themselves in their office to deliberate.

He’s not breathing too fast, or blinking too hard.

The students in the other dorms are on strict orders to stay inside, leaving the green eerily empty and quiet as Nick follows the distant sound of the lamppost siren, racing across the grass. They set up this system for sexual assault on campus, for emergency medical situations; rigging the lampposts for activation by campus security monitors was an afterthought, and untested—until now.

He hops both gates to cut through the library grounds, nearly runs into a tree in the darkness of the early morning, and finds the activated lamppost.

That isn’t all he finds.

His lungs ache from the run here, but he throws himself forward to the side of the admissions building, heading for the crumpled body propped up against the brick wall, lights from the lamppost catching on a slick of red staining pale, folded hands.

“Hey,” Nick says, like a warning, and feels the grass stain the knees of his jeans. His fingers shake on the underside of Phil’s jaw.

“Icelandic exchange student,” Phil mumbles, raising his head. “Seen him in the library before. Folklore And Mythology minor.”

“Easy, easy,” Nick says. He lays one hand over Phil’s, blood hot and wet under his palm. “Give a statement later. Just stay awake for now. What day is it?”

“Yeah,” says Phil, but he’s already slumping again.

Nick’s heart is trying to drill through his chest, but he manages: “Eyes on me, man. Eyes on me.”

Phil looks up again, and when he stares at Nick’s face, Nick sees the wet light catching in the corners of his eyes. He’s scared as fuck and all alone out here.

“Hey,” Nick says, not a warning at all. He presses his hands harder over Phil’s, holding them firm over the bleeding from who-knows-what. Almost inaudible, he adds: “I got you.”

Phil’s smile is weak, but it’s something.

“Okay,” Phil says. 

“What day is it, Phil?” Nick asks, telling himself that his voice isn’t cracking.

“October.” Phil sounds unsure of even that, but he manages a nod. “October. Help me out.” He swallows something behind his weak smile, maybe blood. “Help...” 

“Starts with a one,” Nick says, and it all breaks coming out of his mouth, desperately fast, anything to keep Phil from saying that again. 

Phil looks like he’s trying. And Nick can’t do anything else, and he’s scared of how much further he could fall apart if he talks, so he just waits, and holds eye contact until the wail of more official sirens fades in from down the street, promising help.

“Sorry,” says Phil, nearly muted by the police cars and the ambulance pulling up across the green. There’s blood on his mouth. “Should’ve caught him.”

Nick glances at the EMTs, still far off, and steals this one moment, leans in to rest the line of his mouth against Phil’s forehead.

“You did good,” Nick says, with all the closeness he’s allowed right now. Less sure, he adds: “I’ll ride along.”

“No,” Phil says, and sounds like he only half means it. “You hate hospitals. Told me once.” His eyes are starting to close, but he keeps them fixed on Nick’s face. “Stay here. Tell staff what I told you.” 

Nick leans back, planning to argue, but the half terrified, half determined look on Phil’s face stops him.

“Just a scratch, anyway,” Phil promises, hands trembling under Nick’s, blood thick between their fingers.

“Yeah,” Nick says.

Phil is trying to be strong, and Nick lets him, for as long as he has him.

Watching them lift Phil up, EMTs babbling about blood loss and puncture wounds and blankets, Nick isn’t listening. He watches Phil mumble to them about the transfer student, and then Phil spots a cop and his eyes go wide, he’s begging one of the EMTs to stay and tell the cops what he told them. And then Phil fixes on Nick again, and there’s a lot of blood at the corners of his mouth and more flecking his chin, and his eyes catch wide and damp in the lights of the cars.

In the last moment before the doors close, Phil looks scared, and he doesn’t hide it from Nick at all.

The ambulance is gone, the police listen to the EMT repeat what Phil said—they still ask Nick to empty his pockets looking for anything sharp, and fine, all right, Nick knows this game—and then there are faculty advisors are everywhere and Nick’s still got Phil’s blood all over his hands.

A Lit professor Nick’s never met leads him away to check the student records, telling the cops in no uncertain terms that she’ll _fax_ them the information they need, so they have no further need to question Nick.

To Nick’s credit, he gets all the way to her office before he throws up in her wastebasket.

She brings him some paper towels soaked in hot water, and coffee from the faculty lounge, folding her hands around his newly clean fingers when he almost drops the cup.

There’s blood in Nick’s pockets, and on his keys, and he still has a job to do. Phil passed him the message. Phil remembered the kid who did this to him. If they’re gonna catch the guy, Nick has to focus. 

He starts to talk, carefully playing it all back for her to write down. With every word, he's still stuck on a lost, distant mental image—Phil sprawled on an operating table, angry red stitches across the pale skin of his shoulder, yellow staining his wrist where the IV threads in.

Nick rubs nervously at the corner of his fake left eye. He’s no fan of hospitals since that whole mess, even if the lawsuit money did get his family enough for a realistic-looking replacement. Would he be letting Phil down if he said he couldn’t visit him?

He keeps moving his mouth, mechanical and steady, hearing his own voice faintly like he's sitting in another room.

_—gainst the wall, over at Admissions_ , he can hear himself saying, _and I could see he was bleeding._

He throws up in the professor's wastebasket again. She passes him the key to the faculty restroom, and tells him to take five.

Nick needs five. He needs ten, and fifteen, and it's twenty whole minutes before he's finally back in her office, talking again, about Phil's bloodied fingers and his thready voice, and about the transfer student Phil saw, not at all about Phil's clammy, sweat-damp forehead under the line of Nick's mouth.

For the next two days, Nick stays in his room, and it’s the only thing he thinks about.

* * *

+2.

Nick hates hospitals.

Nick hates a lot of things, to be fair, but hospitals really do rank high on the list.

"A physical list?" Phil asks hazily from his bed, grinning at Nick. "Because I have a list."

"You, of all people?" Nick deadpans. "Shocked. I am shocked."

Phil laughs, and it looks like it hurts. Nick hasn't stopped looking at Phil's face since he walked into the room, desperate to avoid any reminder of where they are.

"Lists are soothing," Phil says, closing his eyes. There are dark circles under them, and he's pale as _fuck_ , and losing the eye contact makes Nick feel weird and scared.

"Yeah," says Nick, his voice sounding strange and quiet to his own ears. He wants Phil to keep talking. "You should make a list now."

"Hmm." Phil smiles a little, and it's something. It's proof he's still awake, alive, whatever. "Okay. I got one."

"Shoot," Nick says.

"Right. Here's a list," says Phil, shuffling a little where he's lying down. "A good— _ow_ —list."

He winces just slightly and Nick's heart feels like it might hammer right out of his body. Nick nods along quickly, like Phil can see his chest tightening, like he has to distract from it.

"Item one," Phil says. "Your coat. The really long one you always put over me when I fell asleep studying in your room."

"All right," Nick says, nodding along and feeling a warmth in his cheeks, unexpected. "That's one."

"Item two," Phil goes on, his voice light and easy, seeming like he's gotten comfortable. "The way you read my math textbooks."

Nick is starting to catch on.

"Oh, no."

"Three," Phil goes on, grinning wider. "That thing you do when I'm falling asleep—"

"Oh, my god," Nick groans, putting his face in his hands.

"—where you put your hand on the back of my neck," Phil goes on with great affection, despite Nick's embarrassed noise. "And rub that spot behind my ear."

"Phil Coulson, I will leave this hospital room right now," Nick says, glaring at Phil through his fingers.

"Nah," Phil says, meeting Nick's good eye. His smile is warm, and real, and all the fear locked up tight in Nick's chest starts to unwind. "You've stuck with me through worse."

"True enough," Nick agrees, half into the palm of his hand.

Still looking serene, and calm, Phil rests his head back on his pillow again, eyes closing. It's not as scary now, not nearly the look of him against the brick wall three nights ago, or the way he looked sunken and beat-up when Nick first saw him from the doorway.

He actually looks pretty happy, now that Nick's been here for a minute or two.

"I'm kidding, y'know," Phil says, sounding sleepy. "I know you're weirded out, being here. You don't have to force yourself."

Nick swallows all the really big things he could say, all the things that are too much, and he carefully moves his chair closer, resting a hand on Phil's arm, near the curve of his elbow. It's close enough to the yellowed, IV-dyed skin on Phil's wrist, and a bruise on his bicep, that Nick feels that little twinge of fear.

But.

"I'm fine," Nick lies, looking back up at Phil's face.

And Phil stares back, always Nick's good eye, seeing right through him, but answering: "Okay."

Phil's never been the type to give Nick a hard time when he's putting on a brave face. He understands that's something Nick just has to do.

Phil finds other ways.

Like this, when he smirks, and even with his small, tired voice, he's all light and joy and a little bit of mischief when he says: "It's a long list, you know. "

Nick makes a show of huffing like he's more embarrassed than endeared, but his fingertips rest light on Phil's arm, and he smiles more softly, more indulgently, than he would usually let himself.

He listens to Phil start up again, under the quiet sounds of the hospital around them, murmuring: "Item four. You let me steal the blankets. Like. All of them."

Nick smiles, rubbing his thumb against the inside of Phil's wrist, and Phil keeps mumbling, talking himself back to sleep.

Nick still hates hospitals. And they're still at the top of his list.

But he thinks maybe Phil has the right idea, making a different kind of list.

And he thinks back to two Septembers ago, when Phil was just a scrawny mess falling on Nick at transfer orientation, or an hour later when he passed Nick a note in the financial aid office, scrawled in his too-neat handwriting— _want to split books?_ —with a nervous, daring look in his eyes, barely even knowing Nick but already taking a chance on him.

Nick sits beside him, still touching the curve of Phil's elbow while he sleeps, and he thinks about a lot of things, until he isn't really thinking about hospitals at all.


End file.
